


The Future Set Free.

by RedStarFiction



Category: Shameless (US), gallavich - Fandom
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Gallavich, M/M, POV Mickey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-29
Updated: 2017-08-29
Packaged: 2018-12-21 12:41:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11944437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedStarFiction/pseuds/RedStarFiction
Summary: This piece is something I have been mulling over all day. I don't actually know why all of this Gallavich stuff is pouring out of me at the moment, I've written thousands of words in three days, but I can't concentrate on writing anything else so I am going with it and thank you to everyone who is travelling this with me and encouraging me along the way.This piece follows Mickey from age 4 to 18. It is grim because I think Mickey's childhood was probably grim. But there is hope within it and if Gallavich teaches us anything it is that where there is hope, love can spring eternal.Shamelessly4Shameless on Tumblr.





	The Future Set Free.

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning - this piece contains allusions to child abuse and although it is nothing that the show doesn't prepare us for, I am aware that seeing it written can be very difficult.

He’s four years old, his bedsheets are cold and wet and he can hear the TV in his father’s room which means Terry is awake and if he is awake then Mickey can’t get to the laundry shoot and dump his wet clothes and bedding because he might get caught and getting caught is more terrifying than the dream which caused the accident.  
He slips out of his pants and stuffs them as far under the bed as he can and tugs off his t-shirt, using it to try and soak up as much of the pee as he can. He’s trying not to cry, trying not to make a single sound. The TV shuts off and he freezes, his heart pounding so loud in his ears that he is convinced the whole house will hear. The hallway light shuts off and he is plunged into darkness, his arms trembling as he listens to his Dad cough, light a cigarette, cough again and finally, mercifully, kick his bedroom door shut.

*

He is seven years old. He’s been crying because he brought a cat home to be his pet, but it ran away as soon as the back door got opened. His older brother sees his eyes are red and pushes him against the wall, Mickey’s head hits the corner of his Dad’s liquor cabinet and for a moment the world seems to tilt and then there is a burst of blinding pain and he is crying again. His Dad comes out of the bedroom with a woman Mickey doesn’t recognise and asks him if he wants to shut up or get something to really cry about? The woman tells Terry that Mickey is cute and sways towards him, her lips a painted bright pink and she smells like the burger shop he walks past on his way to school. Mickey wipes his eyes and tries to stop hiccuping, his head is bleeding and the woman cups his face in her hands telling him he’s going to grow up so handsome, she tells him she’ll fuck him one day and behind her Terry laughs and tells Mickey to feel her tit. Mickey does as he is told and both adults laugh. His Dad gives him a dollar and tells him to get himself a pop or something and stay out of the fucking house. 

*

He’s nine, it’s his birthday, he doesn’t have a cake or balloons but he has his first pack of smokes and his first beer and he feels sick and light headed before he finishes either. The beer is bitter and he pulls a face. His Dad slaps his left cheek, a warning slap. It stings but it doesn’t even knock him out of the chair. Mickey is careful not to pull any more faces, he is grateful and he finishes the beer. Mandy has drawn him a picture and he wants to tell her it’s good but his brother tells her it’s dumb and Mickey agrees. His Dad nods in approval and tells Mandy to go find something she’s good at. Mandy doesn’t cry, she’s already better than Mickey at controlling that. 

*

He’s eleven and he’s outside the principles office. He’s been there since first period. It’s nearly three. This is his fifth fight of the week and it’s only Tuesday. The kid he beat up was collected by his Mom ages ago. As they walked past him, she scolded Mickey and said that he needs his behind spanked and Mickey sneered at her with contempt. If that is worst thing she can think of then it is no wonder her son is a fucking pussy. He doesn’t say that though, he just spits at her. She isn’t worth more energy than that. The principle has told him that his father has been called and Mickey is to sit there until he shows up. Mickey knows he’ll spend the day on that chair, he knows he’ll sit there until the principle realises what Mickey has known all along, Terry isn’t coming.  
No one asks what caused the fight and that is just as well because Mickey would never tell them that the boy he beat up made Mickey’s chest feel tight, that the way the sun caught his red hair and made it look aflame made Mickey’s fingertips tingle with the urge to touch it. He wouldn’t have been able to articulate how badly he wanted to kiss the boy’s mouth and how terrifying that was to Mickey, there isn’t much worse in this world than being a fag, Terry has told him this and Mickey believes it.  
When he gets home Terry doesn’t look up from the TV, just tells Mickey to bring him a beer.  
“Did you kick his ass?”  
He grunts as Mickey hands it to him  
“Yeah Dad.”  
“Good. Bag is on the side.”  
Mickey takes the bag and goes out to run his errands, tucking the gun his father has given him into the back of his pants. He comes back a while later and hands his father the cash. It is exactly right. Mickey took ten dollars once. Terry made sure that Mickey only did it once. Mickey’s nose twitches and his left eye blinks almost uncontrollably as Terry counts the money and he feels sick even though he already knows the money is exact. Mickey thinks of this feeling as ‘home’ he doesn’t recognise it as fear. 

*

The Milkovich’s aren’t Jewish but Mickey is thirteen which means he is a man now. He gets his first tattoo. He smokes his first joint. He smokes regular tobacco daily now but the joint is a revelation. His father buys him his first fuck. Mickey feels kind of repulsed by the woman Terry picks, she looks young but her skin is flaccid and so is Mickey’s cock. She keeps going though and finally he manages something which satisfies her and she lets him go back out to his fathers and brothers. Mickey is aware that they are cheering, laughing, teasing him and slapping his back but it all seems really far away and Mickey is glad about that. He pushes what he is feeling down as far as it will go and forces himself to smile at his family.  
Later that night he is flicking through a magazine and an advert for male underwear catches his eye. Next to it is a female perfume add. Both of them have scantily clad models and Mickey takes it into the bathroom. He tries to keep his eyes on the perfume model, but they keep straying to the underwear model. He tries to focus on her long legs and parted lips, but he is drawn to the wide shoulders and narrow hips of the man. He throws the magazine at the wall and closes his eyes to finish but even behind his closed eyelids he sees the flat sculpted chest and chiselled jaw tasked with selling Calvin Klein. 

*

He’s seventeen and his sister is crying because some punk has pissed her off, some little fuckwad called Ian Gallagher. He knows who the Gallagher’s are and he knows that this one works at the Kash and Grab. Mickey goes over with his brothers. He is still the shortest, still the one his Dad is likely to take a swipe at first but he’s not the one they pick on now. No way. Mickey has a reputation now, on the streets, in juvie, even amongst his brothers. He’s a South-Side thug, through and through. His knuckles say ‘FUCK U-UP” and they will. It is not an idle threat and everyone knows it. Mickey Milkovich is dangerous. Gallagher is fucked and the little bitch doesn’t even realise it.

*

Mickey is eighteen. He’s an adult now. No more juvie, no more running away. He’s a grown man and he is in love and he doesn’t even begin to know what to do with that. He can’t stop thinking about Ian. When he isn’t near him, he wants to be and when he is near him, his skin itches with the craving of his touch. Mickey doesn’t flinch when Ian grabs him, he doesn’t panic when Ian catches him looking at him. He wants the taste of Ian on his lips, wants his smell deep inside his nostrils and his arms wrapped tight around him at night. But Mickey is afraid. It is a fear that seems to have been ground into his bones, and it chafes his soul every waking minute.  
One of the worst things a man can be is a fag, that is what Mickey knows and he hates himself and he hates Ian for bringing this thing out in him, for making it harder to ignore.  
But even as he hates him, Mickey dreams of a small house with clean windows and brightly painted furniture and he imagines serving Ian coffee for breakfast in the morning and lighting his evening cigarette off the end of Mickey’s own at night.  
He hits Ian. He calls him names and tells him that he fucks other people. He tells Ian not to touch him, tells him not to look at him. He runs away and hides. 

*

He wakes in the night and his bed sheets are cold and wet with sweat and lust that Mickey can’t shed when he is awake. He can hear the TV in his Dad’s room and he tries not to be seen as he walks into the hall and dumps his laundry down the chute.

He cries when no one is home and when he gets caught with red rimmed eyes he beats the shit out of his brother and then fucks one of the three women Terry brought home. Her lips are painted bright pink and she stinks of greasy meat and all the while he is thinking of Ian and pretending he is somewhere else.

He sits out on the porch desperately hoping Ian will walk by and praying that he won’t. He smokes a packet of cigarettes and drinks a six-pack of beer. Mandy shows him a new dress and he tells her it makes he look fat. There father grunts in approval and Mandy flips them both off as she walks away.

He runs out of beer and goes to buy more. A redheaded young man looks him up and down and Mickey feels his cock grow hard. He shoves the guy and when he falls over Mickey kicks him twice, three times. A woman walks past and screams at him that he’s an animal, she tells him he should be locked up. Mickey screams back at her. He tells her that she has no fucking idea what he needs and calls her foul names. He spits after her retreating back.  
He collects the debts his family is owed and takes the money home. Terry doesn’t count it. Mickey counts it. It’s all there. Every fucking dollar. Mickey doesn’t know why he doesn’t rip the old man off but even when he thinks about doing it, an alarm goes off in his head and he pushes the thought away.

He goes into the bathroom and picks up a magazine. He flips to the picture of a swimmer with red hair and a slim muscular build. He looks at the bulge in the speedos and bites his lip until his eyes squeeze shut and he tosses the magazine back in the rack.

He goes out into the street and stands opposite the Gallagher house wondering if Ian is there. He has a reputation and when the kids see him, they draw the curtains but they must have told Ian because the door opens and for Mickey, time stands still. Ian smiles at him, that goofy lopsided grin that Mickey would die just to get a glimpse. Mickey is fucked and he well and truly realises it.

*

“Hey.”

One word. Just one tiny word. History is doomed to repeat itself unless something dramatic happens to knock it from it’s axis, upset the plans and set the future free.  
Mickey feels his lip quirk upwards and raises his hand in greeting.

“Hey. You wanna hang out?”

History wobbles, it shakes, it trembles and it falls from it’s axis. The future bursts forth in a rush of possibility and Mickey Milkovich steps through the void and sets his feet on the path toward freedom.


End file.
